


The vampire next door

by cottoncandyboys



Category: ONEUS (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Vampire, It's supposed to be a different take on vampire aus, M/M, it's not angst i swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2020-06-18
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:49:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24784915
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cottoncandyboys/pseuds/cottoncandyboys
Summary: Keonhee has just gotten a new next door neighbor.
Relationships: Lee Keonhee/Yeo Hwanwoong
Comments: 6
Kudos: 63





	The vampire next door

**Author's Note:**

> alright so i started writing this many many years ago and lost inspiration but i recently got into oneus and realized this fic would fit them and decided to revive it
> 
> i tried my best at this as i have never written any vampire au and the fact that i wanted to have a different take on this trope, seeing that all of these stories usually are angsty, i wanted to change it a bit
> 
> this is not beta-ed so sorry for any mistakes

It's dark outside, the building isn't the tallest in the neighborhood but it is tall enough for Keonhee to be able to see the lights of the city, though it doesn't make that much of a difference in his life.

The curtain is closed shut, the lights are still visible but much softer due to the beige fabric in front of it. The coffee table in the middle of the small living room has a delicate glass sitting on top of it, filled with what looks like wine. Its owner quietly sits himself in the single armchair in the tiny living room. Keonhee crosses his legs and gracefully takes the glass in hands, sipping the liquid as if it is from the last bottle in existence.

He sighs, dropping his gaze to his lap and, subsequently, to the red carpet. The tip of his lips shine in the dim lit room, still wet from his drink and a sigh leaves those same lips whilst his eyes close slowly.

The glass remains untouched on the coffee table, just a shallow layer of purple left on its bottom, but Keonhee is sound asleep, too relaxed to even care about it.

The pain on his neck is what makes him stir in his sleep, uncomfortable and uncalled for. He then pushes his body to a standing position, raising both arms above his head and yawning, trying to get rid of the drowsiness that's still on him.

Much to Keonhee's dismay, his glass had been dropped while he was asleep and now the light colored maple furniture has a reddish-purple sticky stain on it. It is not big, but it is dry and wine always leaves stains. "Alphonse," he mumbles and walks to retrieve a damp cloth to wipe his beloved coffee table - good enough that the glass did not shatter.

Keonhee feels something around his calves and looks down.

"Alphonse, why did you do that?" The feline does not spare him a glance, just meows and takes his previous place on the lonely seat. "You're way too spoiled."

His words don't have much effect, the cat takes a few circular turns to make itself more comfortable - _cats_ , he mumbles - and decides to lie down and sleep. Keonhee just resumes what he was going to do previously, clean the mess.

Out of nowhere, a sound startles Keonhee. He jumps a good ten centimeters, bringing a hand to his chest out of habit and, just after a few seconds of silence, there is the same sound once again.

Someone is knocking hard on his door.

Quite wary of who the hell could be, because he, Keonhee, did not have any friends nor did he know any of his neighbors, he quietly tiptoes his way to the door, careful not to cast a shadow that would appear on the other side and just waits. He's a little put off by the fact that he couldn't sense that someone was standing in front of his door until now.

And then comes another knock, softer this time, as if the person is starting to give up on the idea.

Silence remains for some seconds, but Keonhee isn't so lucky. The knocks are softer but it really doesn't mean that whoever is behind the wooden door is giving up. He takes one deep breath and turns the key resting on the lock in a swift movement, opening it and startling the person who decided to disturb him. It's a boy - he assumes, after checking the height of his visitor.

"May I help you," Keonhee pauses and stares down at the boy, raising a single brow and giving him a small smile. "Sir?"

The mocking on his voice is quickly noticed and the boy presses his lips in a thin line, clearly displeased.

"I'm new here and it seems that none of the other residents are home," the boy starts. _Lies_ , thinks Keonhee. He can clearly see that at least two people on their floor are there, they just didn't want to bother with the new neighbor. There is a pause and Keonhee's stare forces the boy to keep talking. "And since you're apparently the only one around, I was wondering if you have a ladder that you'd be willing to lend me."

"I don't have one," he replies, the boy's small smile falls and Keonhee ponders for a while. "I can try to help you out?" He's considerably tall after all.

That same small smile comes back to the new neighbor's lips, a little bigger this time, and Keonhee crosses _do some charity this century_ from his list.

He sighs once more and follows the new neighbor that starts walking away without saying anything. Keonhee assumes he accepted the offer by the smile he was given a few seconds ago and thinks it was his cue to go after him.

"Thanks a lot, you've saved my life," the new neighbor, named Hwanwoong as Keonhee has learned, bows and reaches to shake hands with him. Keonhee stares at it for a full minute until Hwanwoong gives him a weird look and puts his hand away. "I think I'll head back into my apartment because I have a lot of things to organize, see you around."

The sound of the door being closed wakes Alphonse up and Keonhee has to deal with the feline's hunger before processing what had just happened. Once done, he sits down on his armchair. He looks at the stain still there, he had forgotten to clean it so he gets up _once again_ and resumes his activities from an hour ago while a lot is going on in his mind.

He comes to a few conclusions after much thinking: his new neighbor Hwanwoong is below average height and has no sense of touch because he didn't retreat when he held Keonhee's icy hands by accident when he was handing him the boxes to be put on a high shelf, which was, to put it simple, extremely troubling.

Still puzzled by what had just taken place an hour ago, Keonhee heads towards the bathroom to take a hot shower.

He'll have trouble falling asleep later today.

It has been exactly a week since the Hwanwoong incident - that's how Keonhee started referring to it whenever the thoughts come back to mind when he is just trying to read a book or checking the newspaper -, the funnier part is that ever since, he hasn't heard a single sound coming from the apartment but it doesn't bother him much since he does the same thing.

He decides to go out and check if he has any mail. The perks of being a vampire is that Keonhee can run up and down the stairs without getting tired and not having to wait for the elevator. He does just that and when he is about to go back up, a few letters under his arm, he faces Hwanwoong as he is exiting the elevator.

"Well, good morning," Hwanwoong greets him and fixes the strap of the backpack he's carrying. "I haven't seen you leave your apartment ever since you helped me."

Keonhee is a little skeptical, he is sure there is no way Hwanwoong would know if he leaves his apartment or not, Keonhee makes sure that the noise in his apartment is minimal so nobody knows if he's home or not. Keonhee on the other hand knows that Hwanwoong leaves every week day around nine and comes back a little after six.

"I do go out sometimes," Keonhee lies, hoping it is convincing and tightens the hold on the letters he has in his possession.

"Right," Hwanwoong says while he looks at his phone screen. "I gotta go, see you."

He runs out of the building and Keonhee stares dumbly at the entrance for a few more seconds, even after Hwanwoong is not in his line of sight anymore. He shakes his head and rubs his eyes, resuming what he was about to do before this encounter.

The letters are just some random announcements and his monthly bills after all, nothing special. It's not like Keonhee was actually waiting for something like that. He decides to turn his laptop on and check if he has received any email regarding his work since the month is a week from being over.

Alphonse meows loudly by Keonhee's left and enters the kitchen the moment his owner looks at him. For a second, Keonhee considers ignoring his pet and sitting down to check his emails but Alphonse is insistent and he's hungry so it's not a hard decision to be made.

In all honesty, Keonhee wonders how he's still alive and healthy even if it's been over a century since he had last tasted human blood - or any blood at all. The solution his friend back then had come up with was ridiculous but it made sense and it worked, so he's been living on a diet of "things you can consider essential in the composition of blood" as Geonhak called it. Geonhak even helped him adapt to it, the two of them already tired of terrorizing humans against their will, since both had been human too and it made them feel bad.

And wine, of course. Keonhee is not a connoisseur but he likes having wine at least three times a week. He always has a spare bottle at home, the employees at the supermarket must think he's an addict by now.

"Anyway," he mumbles to himself and stops thinking so much about the past. Geonhak is gone as his friend decided to move out of the country and go somewhere else - he thinks it was Russia or something like that, it's been way too long since that happened. Alphonse hisses at him and Keonhee hisses back, striding into the kitchen and dropping the food into the cat's bowl.

For himself, he prepares something easy and eats it there, not bothering to sit down properly at the dining table. It's not like there is someone waiting for him. After he's done the dishes, Keonhee goes back to the living room, sitting down in front of his laptop and logging into his email. His boss has sent him two days ago an email with the list of questions they have received from the magazine readers last month and Keonhee, as the person in charge of selecting the ones he wants to answer, takes his sweet time wondering what type of questions he should go for this month. One thing that he is sure is that he is not good with relationship advice, even if that's the majority of the questions the magazine gets monthly.

Once deciding on a theme and selecting the questions, Keonhee decides to do the rest the next day since he has a lot of time - it needs to be done by the first week of the next month as usual.

As he randomly runs his eyes on the list of questions he left open in his inbox, Keonhee's eyes focus on something.

_Writer-nim, have you ever fallen in love and regretted that you didn't do anything to make it happen?_

He remembers reading that one and jumping it without hesitation. Keonhee thinks back to centuries ago and closes his eyes, hitting his own head hard so he stops the flashbacks from pouring in but if they don't come back to him now, he'll surely be haunted in his dreams. With a swift movement, he closes his laptop and takes it out of the force, opting for a hot shower to make himself forget some things. Whenever he feels troubled, sad or anxious, Keonhee takes a hot shower to remember himself how it felt like to have warm skin and rosy colored cheeks.

Keonhee looks down at his hands and then at his clothes. He feels warmth spreading up his chest and he quickly reaches out to touch his cheeks. They feel warm like a living person's one. He focuses again on his clothes and notices he's wearing something he hasn't seen in person for at least half a century or even more. Movement ahead catches his eyes and he holds his breath. Now it explains why he felt his heart fluttering a few seconds ago.

"Youngjo!" Keonhee sees a familiar person calling the man and he hides himself as best as he can, his heart beating fast. "Let's go home?"

"Let's go," Youngjo answers and Keonhee hears his voice, closes his eyes and sighs. He decides to follow the two, walking a good distance behind them. The sun is almost gone but Keonhee knows this path by heart. He even skips on his way and when the two figures disappear into a small house, Keonhee is alone on the street. The moon is high up and the streets that had some people before are now completely empty. He looks around and a shiver runs down his spine. Before he's able to do anything, Keonhee feels a tight grip on his shoulders.

"What are you doing outside just by yourself?" The voice comes out in a whisper and Keonhee closes his eyes, a silent scream goes past his lips when he feels a sting on his neck.

Keonhee jumps from his bed, almost falling down but his reflexes now are good and that rarely happens. He pushes the palms of his hands against his eyes and sits down, breathing loudly.

"Why?" He mumbles and sighs shakily. "Why now?"

He remembers that day clearly. He woke up alone in the woods a few meters from where he was before everything happened, his blood staining his clothes and his skin cold. He remembers all the years watching as his parents kept trying to find him as he never showed up at his house. Not like _this_ , he wasn't able to let his parents know. He ended up feeding from humans from his village but he never transformed anyone like the vampire who did this to him.

Keonhee also remembers Youngjo and how he loved him, despite never exchanging a single word with the man, especially not after he was turned into what he is now. He watched as Youngjo grew old, eventually passing due to age and Keonhee was still there, the same as when he was twenty years old. He's already over that as many years passed by already but it's still one of his many sad memories.

After a few years he left the village, not being able to watch as his loved ones perished. It hurt too much and everything reminded him of them. So he moved around the country - taking a few of his old clothes he sneaked out of his old bedroom a long time ago -, taking up random jobs here and there to gather enough money until he decided to settle down in Seoul. There he met Geonhak by chance and they soon became friends, the rest is history, literally.

"Alphonse," Keonhee exclaims when his cat enters the bedroom, picking the feline up and holding him in his arms. "I hate thinking about the past."

As response, Alphonse meows, reminding Keonhee that he needs to feed the cat. He wonders what day it is, so he grabs his phone to check. It's Saturday - and it's past noon on top of that. Keonhee puts the phone back on the nightstand, he doesn't even use that device properly since he doesn't have any friends. Geonhak left before cell phones even existed so Keonhee has no way of contacting his old friend.

As Alphonse is eating, someone knocks on the door.

Keonhee freezes and wonders who it is before he senses it's Hwanwoong at the other side. He smells green tea coming from the door as it is the usual smell that comes from the other's apartment. There are many questions going on inside Keonhee's head but at the moment all he wants to know is why this boy is knocking on his door.

He checks his clothes, he's not on his pajamas, thankfully last night he fell asleep with his usual outfit, and walks toward the entrance, unlocking the door and peeking from behind it.

"Yes?" he says, looking at the short boy in front of him. "What can I help you with?"

Hwanwoong stares up at him with curious eyes and it looks like he's surprised that Keonhee even answered the door.

"Uh," Hwanwoong stops, closes his mouth, pursues his lips and looks back up at Keonhee. "I ordered too much takeout and I was wondering if you'd like to join me?"

"Me?" Keonhee blurts out, surprised. "Why?"

"Because it's too much food and I don't know anyone in this building," Hwanwoong explains, nodding to himself. "And I don't want to eat the same thing for dinner."

Keonhee considers turning the offer down but the boy looks like he has absolutely no friends and he reminds Keonhee of himself years ago, which is weird.

"Sure, why not," Keonhee answers and exits his apartment, locking the door and following a smiling Hwanwoong into the apartment next to his.

Entering someone else's apartment is weird, Keonhee is not sure if he knows how to act.

"You can just take a seat," Hwanwoong points to a small four-seats table with the food. Keonhee follows as instructed and observes as the boy takes the empty seat right in front of him. "So have you left your apartment lately?"

Keonhee is honestly taken aback by the question. He doesn't know if Hwanwoong is trying to tease him or what. "Yeah," he lies and waits for the boy to finish filling his bowl with the food and then he does the same.

"How long has it been since you're living here?" Hwanwoong asks, cheeks full and Keonhee would laugh if he wasn't worried about these questions, he doesn't want to be rude but he also doesn't want to reveal much about himself.

"Since I was a kid," he lies again, he can't possibly say _for the past sixty years_ and hope Hwanwoong won't freak out. "I heard this apartment was empty for years," Keonhee knows that of course, in fact he was living here when the last person who was living there moved out. "How did you manage to start living here? I didn't know the apartment was for rent or on sale."

Keonhee decides to ask questions too, after all he wants to know a little more about the neighbor who keeps trying to pry into his life.

"It was my mother's," Hwanwoong replies, his mouth full again. "She passed away recently and left it for me, since I didn't want to keep living in the countryside by myself, I moved here."

Instead of thinking too much, Keonhee nods and keeps eating, wondering if the boy is going to ask more questions.

"How old are you?"

"Twenty-one," Keonhee lies _again_ , he hates lying but he can't say the truth in this situation. "You?"

"I turn twenty-one in a few months," Hwanwoong replies, putting his chopsticks down, already finished with the meal. "I mean- uh, never mind."

Keonhee is skeptical at how Hwanwoong stopped himself so fast, as if he was going to spill a secret by accident.

"Do you need help cleaning up?" Keonhee offers, noticing that he's finished with his meal.

Hwanwoong shakes his head. "I just need to throw these away, don't worry," he gets up and starts gathering the empty containers. "Thanks for the company."

"You're welcome," Keonhee replies. "I have to go now, thanks."

Hwanwoong nods and leaves for the kitchen, Keonhee mumbles goodbye and leaves the apartment. He closes the door and goes back inside his own apartment, he feels weird for interacting so much with a human.

And what about the apartment belonging to Hwanwoong's mother? He's sure the owner was a woman around her forties and that was over fifty years ago, it can't be his mother unless she had him when she was eighty and something years old. And he's sure nobody bought this apartment from that woman since not even a single person moved in until now.

Keonhee is confused and being confused makes him anxious because not many things at this point manage to make him feel like this. He opts for yet another shower and decides to work on those answers he's supposed to send soon in order to take his mind off things for a while.

Many months pass by and Keonhee goes back to his normal routine. He takes care of his cat, reads a book, drinks wine and sleeps. He even manages to forget that Hwanwoong even lives there as the apartment next door is always silent and, most of the time, empty.

His neighbor hasn't knocked on his door since that day and Keonhee decided not to interact with the human again, he's alright the way he is and he definitely doesn't need friends.

It's a little troubling that Keonhee was thinking just that when he senses someone about to knock on his door. He closes his eyes and sighs, hearing then the light tapping on his door.

He _knows_ it's Hwanwoong and he wants to know just why he is there again. Keonhee surely didn't try to get in touch with the boy again and if it were him, he would have given up already.

"Hey there," he says when he opens the door, Hwanwoong looks serious at him. "Is there anything that matters?"

"I'm curious about some things and I'd like to talk to you," Keonhee wants to know where that comes from but he's now curious to what Hwanwoong wants to talk about with him. So he opens the door wider and invites the boy in, thankful that his apartment is normal and not like the eccentric vampires from fiction.

Hwanwoong eyes the single armchair and Keonhee understands. "You can sit there, I'm going to get the stool I have in my bedroom."

He comes back in less than a minute and sits down at a safe distance. "What is it?"

It seems like Hwanwoong has a hard time voicing what's in his mind. Silence reigns for a few minutes, Keonhee doesn't pressure the boy and wonders if Hwanwoong is alright.

"Okay so, some time ago I talked to some of the neighbors," Hwanwoong starts and Keonhee nods slowly, trying to piece things together but coming up with nothing. "I asked them if they knew you," alright Keonhee is starting to get a little worried now. "And all of them said that they've never seen you in person but that you were some weird old man who never left the apartment."

 _Oh shit._ Keonhee should have imagined that someone as nosy as Hwanwoong would go around asking things to the other people living in the building. He indeed never showed his face to anyone and since he takes the stairs, he never met any of the neighbors as well. "I think they're talking about my grandfather, I used to live with him," Keonhee lies and hopes Hwanwoong is going to buy it.

"I know you're lying though," Hwanwoong mumbles and pursues his lips, if Keonhee was still a human he would be sweating right now. "I have a guess to why you're not telling the truth but I'm in no place to demand an answer from you. You owe me nothing and you barely know me."

"What's your guess?" Keonhee says without thinking, he's honestly curious and Hwanwoong looks serious about it. He wonders what he's supposed to do if the boy figures it all out.

It's another moment of silence until Hwanwoong lifts his head and stares Keonhee in the eyes. "You're a vampire, aren't you?" Keonhee's vision goes unfocused for a second and he shakes his head to make it go back to normal, he's about to protest when Hwanwoong continues speaking. "You act just like my mother did, honestly, what's with all this mystery around you guys? I don't understand."

"What?"

Hwanwoong stops babbling and stares at Keonhee.

"My mother, the lady who lived here fifty years ago," Hwanwoong says matter of factly and Keonhee's head is spinning. "She was a vampire too and no, I'm not a vampire. I mean, not fully."

"Holy shit is this even possible?" Keonhee finally says something and holds his head between his hands, his head hurts. "Did she marry a human? I didn't know they could have children?"

"Well, they can but it's not usual," Hwanwoong explains and Keonhee is still too astonished to react more.

"Wait, I'm sorry if this is insensitive, but you said she passed away recently?" Keonhee asks as soon as the fact comes back to him. "I thought vampires were immortal unless someone stabbed them in the heart an-"

"It's not the only way," Hwanwoong cuts him in when he's almost getting into gorey details, he's glad the boy stopped him because he hates thinking about it. "She chose to."

"Oh I see," Keonhee says but he doesn't know anything about it, he wonders if Hwanwoong would get into details about it because he's curious but he's prying too much already. "So," Keonhee clears his throat. "You're not twenty-one, right?" He asks, changing the subject since the talk was getting too morbid for his liking.

"Technically speaking, I should be but I'm not exactly," he answers and Keonhee is amazed at how many things he didn't know about his own species. "Since my mother was not human, I don't age as fast as humans. I should be about forty years old since my birthday was last month. How old are you? For real."

"Physically, I'm twenty-one but I'm supposed to be a century and a half, I stopped counting so I'm not sure. It made me depressed," Keonhee says truthfully and his answer doesn't seem to surprise Hwanwoong.

None of them speak, Hwanwoong nods and Keonhee stares at the carpet.

"I should get going, I'm sorry for intruding into your life like this," Hwanwoong gets up and apologizes, an embarrassed smile on his lips. "I know, I'm insufferable sometimes but I had to make sure."

Keonhee is confused.

"Why?"

Hwanwoong only smiles. "I'll see you around."

And just like that, he exits the apartment, Keonhee doesn't even have the time to get up as he is too dazed due to everything that just happened.

A week later, Keonhee is minding his own business in his apartment when Hwanwoong is knocking _again_ on his door.

"What?" Keonhee answers, not trying to be rude or anything, he just knows Hwanwoong is there because he wants something from him.

"So," Hwanwoong says, gently pushing Keonhee to the side so he can enter the apartment. Keonhee is actually baffled. "Since I have been observing and you seem to be some type of vegan vampire, I'd like to know if you're up to going out for dinner with me. What do you think?"

"Vegan vampire?" Keonhee questions, right eyebrow raised so high it disappears behind his bangs.

"Yeah? You don't drink human blood, do you?"

"Going out? With you?" Keonhee is still registering the invasion of his apartment and everything that Hwanwoong said. "Why?"

Hwanwoong rolls his eyes and Keonhee feels offended, he is many decades older than him and he's treated like they're the same age. "You're always asking for explanations, that's annoying."

Before Keonhee can react to those words, Hwanwoong is rolling his eyes at him again.

"Because you're interesting and I'm interested," Hwanwoong explains. "And I don't know much about you but that's what going out is for."

"You're interested in me?" Keonhee puts a hand on his chest and Hwanwoong gives him a big smile. The boy seems to like seeing Keonhee embarrassed or at a loss of words. "But I'm too old for you?"

"You're not old, you're twenty-one!" Hwanwoong exclaims and crouches down to pet Alphonse who has decided to show up after his afternoon nap. "So?"

Keonhee ponders over the idea, it's weird being asked out but at the same time, Keonhee has never done anything different since ever and Hwanwoong looks like a nice person. Keonhee also has to admit that Hwanwoong is cute and maybe giving it a try won't hurt.

"Yeah, why not?" he shrugs and Hwanwoong stands up in a jump and smiles at Keonhee, his white teeth showing.

"Let's go then?"

"Now?" Keonhee questions, hands on his waist.

"Duh!" Hwanwoong snorts and grabs Keonhee by the arm, dragging him out of the apartment.

"Just let me lock the door," Keonhee pulls away from Hwanwoong's grip and reaches out for his key resting on the keyhole. After he's done, he pockets it and smoothes out his shirt. "Do I look normal?"

"You look good, nobody would ever guess you're not human," Hwanwoong says and Keonhee lets himself be pulled towards the elevator. It's the first time he takes it and he feels awkward but maybe that's how it is like when you do something for the first time after all.

Keonhee feels like Hwanwoong is going to make him go through this more often than he wants to but he's not opposed to it, maybe that's something he has been needing in his life because despite living for so long already, Keonhee hasn't done much. Maybe he needed Hwanwoong.

**Author's Note:**

> if you have read it until the end, thank you and i hope you enjoyed it
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/absolutehaechan)


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